Victory Elements says its newly launched water dissolvable ceramic materials for hydraulic fracturing of oil and gas wells are designed to provide performance and cost advantages compared to conventional practices including faster completion times, reduced completion costs and less environmental impact. The novel system, featuring solid ceramic frac balls of various diameters, fully dissolves in water and brine solutions without acidification and eliminates mechanical processes to remove or retrieve standard frac balls.
According to William Reineke, Business Director for Victory Elements, “Timed dissolution following well stimulation in common frac fluids eliminates the injection of acids needed to reduce many competing dissolvable balls, deployment of workover rigs to mill out deformed or impacted balls and complex surface-level ball catchers. Reductions in time, equipment and materials can greatly economize well completions and generate hydrocarbon flow and revenue sooner. In addition to ease and economy, the dissolving ceramic eliminates uncertainty if deformed or impacted balls have dislodged from their down well seats and assures oil and gas can flow to the surface unimpeded.”
Robert Howard, Victory Elements Technology Director, says, “Our novel formulations and fabrication techniques enable Victory to customize dissolution times to meet each client’s targeted stimulation and release times. End user can now adjust frac ball performance to meet geological conditions and duty cycles.”
Howard continues, “Our dissolvable ceramic balls have been extensively tested for hardness, durability, pressure resistance and dissolve times. Third party testing by independent laboratories have confirmed that the Victory solid ball meets industry standard pressure metrics of 10,000 psi and residence time of six hours on seat.”
Manufactured from nonhazardous materials, the water dissolvable ceramic balls gradually dissolve into their constituent materials, release from tooling seats, and become dilute in surrounding frac fluids. Following stimulation procedures, the dilute materials are conveyed to the surface with brine backflow for collection and disposal.
“High performance tooling that completely dissolves in aqueous solutions is one of the most significant technical developments I have seen in 40 years of oil patch experience,” says Robert Brown, Victory Elements Chief Commercial Officer. “Victory frac balls are available in multiple sizes and can be used with virtually any manufacturer’s tooling system including plug and perf and sliding sleeve systems.”